X-Files S9E6: MAILER-DAEMON: Users unknown

Sestra Amateur: 

Remember the phrase "Trust No 1?" It’s Fox Mulder’s mantra – and probably his computer password for everything – as well as today’s title. So that means we’re about to endure a Mulder-related episode. Speaking of enduring, we open with a Dana Scully voiceover in which she glorifies her relationship with Mulder as she (presumably) talks to their son, William. I really wish I knew why my brain just can’t/won’t focus on the words during these voiceovers.

Scully is impatiently waiting for someone by a set of train tracks while an unknown person watches on a grainy video feed. The scene then cuts to Dana taking William to a coffee shop (why are her footfalls so noticeable? It’s like they put microphones by her boot heels) so she can pore over her anonymous emails from Mulder while using the Internet café’s public Wi-Fi. We’re forced to endure additional voiceovers as Scully reads and replies to Fox’s email because the writers and director don’t trust us to read the screen. 

Dana realizes another mother in the shop has left her child alone to argue with a man outside. Later, at Quantico, Scully re-reads a printed version of Fox’s email. Luckily, she's interrupted by Agents John Doggett and Monica Reyes, who need to find Mulder so a source will disclose the identities of other Super Soldiers. John is surprised Dana isn’t jumping at the chance to get Fox home again. Clearly, she still has trust issues.

Later that night, Scully sees the same woman from the coffee shop and witnesses a custody dispute. She stupidly leaves William alone to handle it instead of calling local police, but luckily nothing happens to Dana’s baby. Scully takes the woman -- Patti -- home with her and they bond over the pathetic-ness of their personal lives. (If Patti looks familiar, it’s because she’s played by Kate and Allie's Allison Smith.) Meanwhile, Team Johnica are on stakeout where Patti's husband works, hoping to get to the Super Soldier source without Dana’s assistance. The husband’s coworker watches Doggett and Reyes on the surveillance monitor.

Back to the grainy opening image of Scully waiting impatiently by the train tracks. Monica and John are in the same area, as if on another stakeout. The scene then cuts to Team Johnica’s stakeout location outside the Super Soldier source building. They follow when Patti’s husband leaves for the day. Inside Dana’s apartment, Patti picks up William while Doggett calls Scully to warn her Patti’s husband just entered Dana’s building. Scully holds Patti at gunpoint while John subdues the husband. For some reason, Reyes is back to calling Dana “Agent Scully.” The three of them interrogate the couple and learn Scully – and William – are being watched. Hubby works for the NSA (National Security Agency). Their daughter, Joy, has abilities similar to William’s. Hubby knows all about our three heroes and William’s psychic ability because his government job is to spy on them. He also claims Fox Mulder is the only one who can connect everything. 

They get interrupted by Hubby’s supervisor, played by Terry O’Quinn, who has been in everything, including the X-Files movie Fight the Future. (I don’t think he’s supposed to be the same character, because FBI Special Agent in Charge Michaud was blown to bits.) He knows Dana has email contact with Fox and arranges a meeting with Scully. (At least she remains on a first-name basis with Reyes.) The caller directs her to take a car and drive like a jerk so no one follows her. She switches cars, probably wishing she had a hands-free headset. After arriving to the middle of nowhere, Dana meets with the Shadow Man and he blows up the rental car. Scully still doesn’t register how much he knows about her (your natural hair color?!?) and considering she doesn’t recognize him, he’s definitely not supposed to be the same guy from Fight the Future. (“Hey, you look just like my blown-up boss’ twin brother!”) He gives her a deadline for contacting Mulder -- and a new rental car.

The next morning, Doggett confronts Dana about what’s happened. He points out how the Shadow Man could probably reach Fox on his own. Scully admits she notified Mulder, who is arriving on the midnight train to … no, not Georgia, probably Virginia. Also on the stakeout is Patti’s hubby, who points a gun at Dana. Actually, he points it at the Shadow Man, who shoots his coworker, gets shot by John and falls onto the tracks at the worst … possible … time. The train operator gets the order to keep the train moving, to Scully’s chagrin. Of course, if Fox was really on that train, he would have jumped off, especially because of Dana's involvement in gunplay. 

Good news for the Shadow Man, he’s a Super Soldier so the gunshot – and the train – didn’t kill him. Scully learns someone jumped from the train. Team Johnica go looking for the man in a rock quarry and think they spot Mulder who keeps running (see? I told you he would have jumped). Dana arrives and finds the Shadow Man and he is very, very pissed. He’s affected by the iron(?) in the rocks surrounding Scully, goes all Silver Surfer and gets pulled into the rock. I guess now they know how to fight the Super Soldiers. Too bad I zoned out during the final voiceover, but that’s probably because I was reading the screen instead of listening.

Sestra Professional: 

When did Mulder and Scully's relationship turn into dime-store paperback fodder? Ugh, those voiceovers, those emails. This is not the way these two have ever related to each other. I feel like I'm watching an episode of thirtysomething (truth be told, that's not a show I  watched, it's just profiling). This is worse than what happened to Moonlighting after David and Maddie finally got it on. (Now that is a show I followed religiously, even through an unending parade of repeats.)

 

The Moonlighting reference seems pretty applicable to the ongoing X-Files run actually. Show creator Chris Carter and executive producer and Frank Spotnitz are the series' No. 1 and 2 guys, but they've concocted something here that feels so far afield from who their protagonists have been for eight-plus years that my head may explode like the Shadow Man's. Yes, we're used to a certain amount of overwriting in the voiceovers, lines akin to, "And in that moment, you will be blessed, and stricken. For the truest truths are what hold us together or keep us painfully, desperately apart." But seriously, is Dana talking to William, or is this Jor-El talking to Superman in the Fortress of Solitude? Are Carter and Spotnitz, expecting the series to end after this season, submitting this script not for Emmy consideration, but to Harlequin in hopes of a new career in romance novels?

I'm physically shaking right now seeing your words: I know how you feel, Scully. My stomach is in knots almost to the point of heaving. "Dearest Dana" ... blech. This is not the way Fox Mulder talks, has ever talked, will ever talk as far as we know. Scully's trust issues obviously don't extend to getting email so clearly not written in Fox's voice, yet she's reading every word over and over again like it was a note she was passed in high-school biology. Even the most ardent shipper has to admit this kind of tripe is not what's so magical about their relationship. 

 

Mulder says he's lonely and he's uncertain of his ability to live like that. From what we know of Fox, he lives for living like that. He wouldn't know what to do with himself if it wasn't Mulder vs. the world. Funny thing is, there are elements for a pretty taut episode if it wasn't for those voiceovers and emails. But they take me so far out of this episode that I can't find a way back into it. I'm also not buying Dana not trusting the two people who have risked life and limb on more than one occasion to help them. It couldn't be because she's starting to enjoy the type of martyrdom we've been hanging around Mulder's neck, could it?

Strangely enough, the two newcomers are faring much better in Carter and Spotnitz's hands. My affection for and attachment to Doggett and Reyes are definitely growing. Note that Monica doesn't want to compromise the possibility of Mulder's return. That is her primary concern. Put a pin in that (and all the other times I point out her motivations), because I'm building a case for later. 

It's a con job: I'll buy there's a danger to Mulder, but isn't the one to William -- and by extension, Scully -- far greater? The consensus seems to be that Fox is in greater danger because he has the capability of figuring things out. Weak. Granted, the show had to come up with some way to cover when David Duchovny didn't want to return, but they should have come up with a better way to do that. Like he actually saw something or is in possession of a crucial piece of information. Why Mulder or his son must die remains a mystery. They don't seem like mutually exclusive options at this point.

"Trust No 1" finally gives us a measure of focus on Scully, something that's been lacking for most of the ninth season. The way she has to follow the mystery man's instructions is compelling. Dana's being watched -- and apparently has been for a long time -- by who knows how many agencies with all forms of technology. Director Tony Wharmby has the proverbial field day utilizing street cameras to raise the level of intrigue.

The Shadow Man ends up voicing words that legions of shippers were not longing to hear -- one lonely night Dana invited Fox to her bed. That kind of shoots down reams of fan fiction from the first eight years. And it points out the distinct differences between that morsel of information and the way the voiceovers and emails deliver more melodramatic Gone with the Wind-level folderol capped with "Until then, I remain forever yours, Dana."

The train station denouement is action-packed and riveting, but we haven't had enough time and space with the National Security Agent to have more of a reaction to his death other than to consider it could have been Mulder's. The quarry scene ends up providing more substance to the ongoing storyline and actually feels more like a glory-days X-Files episode. Of course, Scully gets a bit lucky with the reaction caused by the quarry's iron compound, but it's not a deal breaker.

Guest star of the week: Terrance Quinn. That was an interesting way to go about his billing in the opening credits, aimed at not giving away the fact that the Shadow Man was played by the Millennium regular and incinerated Fight the Future agent. And although it was pretty easy to pick up on the fact that he was Quinn early on, he greatly added to the gravitas of the goings-on. Not to mention the fact that he conveyed one spectacularly unique death scene.